Harvest, 1921

 

Have you ever seen a fat man hanging from a tree?

like a pendant suspended

from the throat of a wrinkled old woman?

Have you ever seen a skinny man hauled up

in front of his burning shop?

the plate glass shattered where he used to look out

at the magnolia blossoms in spring?

It gets hot in June in Tulsa. If you leave a skinny man 

strung up a few days, you get a fat man 

hanging like strange fruit in the devil's grove.

______

for Dverse Poetics: Getting hooked on opening lines. 

Music: Nina Simone Strange Fruit

El Lobo Herido

 

Injury requires solitude

for the blood to slow.

Cold water soothes the throb

and so he walks the river bed.

His belly is empty as the sky

but turns over sickly,

his body's shock at violation.

Up, through the grasses, silently.

He will stay here, concealed

on his side, panting.

Licking the wound, resting

he will either heal or not--live or not--

the same as any other day he has known.

_________

for Sunday Muse #166.

Elk

image by jason limberg

When elk look into their future,
they see their partners, the wolves.
Under gray cotton skies, they find the custodian lost in the woods,
pushing his bucket and mop with difficulty over roots and divots.
When elk speak, they can see their breath,
but the custodian hears nothing, like new dust arranging itself.

When wolves look into their future, 
they see a wounded custodian lagging behind.
The desperate, unsteady sway of keys on his hip
energizes their legs like an artist giddy over the right model.
On their tongues the wolves carry a palette
and with it they paint hunger, satisfied.

When custodians look into their future,
they see rocking chairs secreting themselves among the elk herds.
When wolves circle, the elk stamp their hooves nervously,
their eyes spy-hopping above the horizon like prayer flags.
When wolves kill, custodians return amazed to their mothers
as the huge heads of the elk swivel on the scent of evening.
______

for both Wordy Monday and Art Flash at Real Toads.

Wolf Pack

Where is my child?
Out there, in clockthick air, the icy air.
Where is my mind?
Unspooled to find him, find him in the icy air.

Who forgot the door, the open door?
How soon the night thorn, blood scent, pack with golden eyes?
I forgot the door, the night door;
forgot to call my child, my child with golden eyes.

Where is my body, my body like a bell?
Calling mouths of night thorn, offered as a trade.
I ring under the open door,
To bring the pack my way.

Where is my child?
What fog made me forget?
He runs alone, just flesh and bone,
warm-blooded testament.

Here they are, the thorn sharp pack
to watch me fail and fall;
Why don't they strike, why don't they kill?
Why don't they move at all?

Where is my child? His devil sire
assures me he is dead.
But starlings in his tongue take flight
and leave him mute instead. 

Who forgot the door, the open door?
Who sees what clockthick time becomes?
Where is my child? Out there with them--
in icy air he runs.
_______

for Brendan's "A Little Night Music" at Toads.  

Notes: Recently I had a dream that I had left a door open at night which I should have closed. I realized my boy was outside somewhere and that a pack of wolves and wild dogs which had been waiting and watching, would now have their way. I cast my mind out to find him, but couldn't. So I went to try to shut the door but the pack was already inside. I backpedaled and fell, expecting to be torn to shreds, but the pack just watched me. My ex smiled in a mocking way and told me my boy was already dead, but I didn't believe it. And then I knew--far from being dead, he was out there, vibrantly alive and running with the pack.

Love Poem w/ Wolves

wolves
understand how your body
can sustain their body,
but wolves
have no restraint.

wolves
--these wolves, my wolves--
are as lonely as a motherless girl.
wolves can sing,
and by singing,
become smoke around the moon.

wolves
take my heart and leave moonbeat:
you, you, you.
i never trespass,
and i am a fool.
______

for flash 55 at Toads.